Alias Part 3: Come Home

[cyberghostface]

This took longer than I thought it would be, but here is the third Alias arc. 

Like the trades, I'm going to skip #10 and include it with the next post as it's a stand-alone issue that ties in with that arc better. (It stars J. Jonah Jameson, who features prominently in the subsequent storyline).


Jessica's new case in the small town of Lago, New York where she is investigating the disappearance of a teenage girl. When she gets there, she finds that her presence has already been written about in the local paper, which pisses her off as that sort of negates the purpose of being a "private" investigator.





The mother admits that she wasn't that close to her daughter, and that her daughter had been getting in some trouble at school with mouthing off to various teachers.




She meets up with Rebecca's father, who isn't too happy to see her.






She looks in Rebecca's room but doesn't find anything. The town sheriff later arrives.



Jessica later visits Rebecca's high school.




#12...







As Jessica is about to leave, the woman who runs the local newspaper runs into her and asks about the investigation.




Jessica looks through Rebecca's book which is illustrated with all sorts of abstract illustrations (these are from David Mack).




At the bar going over notes with the sheriff, one thing leads to another. Jessica gets a little drunk and hits on the guy, and the two have sex.






(Art here is by Mark Bagley obviously)

Jessica wakes up from her dream in a jail cell. The sheriff put her there because she was drunk and he wasn't going to let her sleep at his house. Jessica tells him to fuck off and, taking the cue from the newspaper woman, decides to visit the local church.




#13...



The sheriff later runs into Jessica at the local diner to apologize, but she's not having any of it. She later gets a phonecall from Scott Lang; apparently Carol Danvers was trying to set the two of them up on a date.










Jessica doesn't think Rebecca's father is responsible for her disappearance but she decides to pay another visit.







#14...









Jessica takes her home. Rebecca is obviously pissed off but Jessica's not having any of it.

Also it turns out the little kid from last issue was the only person Rebecca liked in town and didn't want him to be worried about her, so she told him where she was going.

Back home, Rebecca's aunt is being arrested for the death of Rebecca's father. Apparently she was drunk and in the midst of an argument with him she took it too far. Rebecca's mother isn't taking it too well.








As Jessica leaves town, she gets another phone call from Scott Lang.


#15...

This issue is a stand-alone story that sort of serves as an epilogue.

Jessica is helping out Matt Murdock and working as one of his bodyguards. Only problem is,  Luke Cage is also there, and the two haven't spoken in a while.





Jessica accuses him of sleeping with her because he's a "cape chaser" and has a fetish for sleeping with superheroes (what Carol told her before).


Luke asks her if she wants to get dinner with him, but she tells him she has other plans.

Later, Jessica meets Scott Lang for their date. She tells the waitress that she'll have a double vodka on the rocks, but Scott interrupts and tells her that she shouldn't.








The two have a somewhat lengthy conversation, which I'm not going to recap here for time reasons, but long story short there's a battle across the street between Spider-Man and Doctor Octopus.




"...I guess I needed someone to do that for me."

Comments

[mrstatham]

And everyone did that brand new game of Asshole Musical Chairs. I swear, the only one who doesn't come across as a dick in this story is Luke Cage, and the father. And Jess, I guess, because you at least expect a moderately antagonistic attitude from her.

But some of those arguments - especially that blame-throwing from the mother (who clearly needs to get her facts straight when she's blaming the father for everything and then immediately turning on the kid because her husband's dead, even though that's partly down to the bullshit she was spouting?) and the kid during the locker scene - they feel eerily close to some arguments I've heard in real life. So as much as he might've given into temptation and railed on Christianity a bit (as I recall, that scene in the church was featured in the cringeworthy moments feature S_D has?), kudos to him.

But then I think Bendis does amazing work when he's not part of the MU proper anyway. Taking place of the fringe (like Daredevil ostensibly did and this does) of the MU, doing books like Ultimate Spider-Man, Powers, Scarlet, and even his all-ages book with Oeming, Takio, they all have merits that his Avengers work doesn't. Unsurprisingly, Moon Knight also looks to be following in DD's footsteps, albeit with more guest-stars.

[shadowpsykie]

.... im confused... that was a cringe worthy moment because the priest was cringe worthy.... and i understood it to be what he said was cringe worthy because its what some people actually believe, not because it was a moment against christianity.

i don't get what you are saying...

he wasn't railing on christianity.... he was railing on people that CLAIM to be christian and preach hate... alot of those people exist.

these are horrible, close minded, bigoted people. this town was basically small town america, which quite frankly makes it a habit of alienating and crushing people that are not homogenous.

[mrstatham]

I just think that it's a bit of an easy and obvious target, personally. I think I did misunderstand exactly what was meant to be cringeworthy (because Jess' responses seem about as standard as the stuff the guy's spouting, somehow), and get Bendis' intent a little bit better now, but I just think that Christianity - be it of the conventional sort or the kind that has been subverted by individuals for rather more seedy messages - is still an easy target. It's either that, or that kind of thing is such a big issue (as explained to me in espanolbot's post below, since the guy's doing), I think it needs more than just a few pages to be dealt with. I think Bendis, if he wanted to do something about Christianity's response to mutants, or the tendency of some to use the message of Christianity to attack mutants (since the only other popular example is William Stryker, I guess) could've done a much more thorough story dealing with the matter and involving Jess. To try and confront the idea in just a few pages just doesn't work for me.

[espanolbot]

What he said, it wasn't a criticism of Christianity, it was a criticism for how even well meaning people can unintentionally use religion to justify terrible things, even in small towns.

The example here was them deciding to rail against Mutants as they were a hot button issue in the Marvel Universe, and thus taking the popular stand against them would invite contraversy and boost attendance.

It's not really any different than aping the comics of Jack Chick, a lot of them involve people doing illogical stuff and saying terrible things (a man who is sexually abusing his daugther is automatically forgiven because he accepts Jesus, for example). The religion itself isn't bad, it's just the way that it's used.

Another example of fundementalists saying weird things, here is Brad Jones reviewing the PSA - Rock: It's Your Decision, which is a propaganda video about rock is evil and you're going to Hell for listening to it.
http://blip.tv/the-cinema-snob/dvd-r-hell-rock-it-s-your-decision-5248679